Within my speaking business, I always had a product mix to offer
clients: books, audio and video programs,
and assessments. I started offering paper-based assessments to clients in 1975. In 1976,
when my Platinum Rule® book was released
by Warner Books, I decided to create an
online assessment for the sole purpose of
selling more books. I was quite surprised that
nearly 10,000 people were taking the online
assessment and raving about it. Four years
later, the blinding flash of obvious finally hit
me: Selling online assessments could be a
business unto itself.

So, in 2000, I spun off my speaking business—staff, equipment, office lease—to my
key employee, Holli Catchpole, to move my
speaking overhead from fixed to variable.
That allowed me to embark on building an
online assessment business. My goal was
to reduce my speaking engagements as my
assessment income grew. This was particularly prescient as the events of 9/11 and the
Great Recession of 2008 played havoc with
the speaking industry.

The first few years were slow growth as I
tried to manage the business with two techies
and myself. As soon as I added a full-time
sales and marketing whiz, though, my assessment business soared. Today, my assessment
revenue substantially exceeds my best year of
speaking revenue.